Wednesday, May 26, 2010
Monday, May 24, 2010
hey everyone
this upcoming week is going to be an exciting one! we have 2 baptisms!! doris is getting baptized on tuesday and debbie is on saturday! its awesome to so quickly see the fruits of your labor! speaking of labor we had 2 opportunities of service this past week. elder cheever and i were heading to a place to go tracting and drove by this lady who was mowing her lawn and so we pulled over and mowed it for her in our shirts and ties haha holy cow was a sweating like a mad man! but it was great and i had a lot of fun doing it. we were talking with a recent convert about it and they wanted us to help them with their yard. so later in the week we went over and helped them and i'll send pics home. we had breakfast at the mcpherons and brother mcpheron cooked us biscuits with chicken gravy and hash browns and scrambled eggs. it was amazing! he is gonna give me the gravy receipe so i can cook it when i get home. at the beginning of the week i was a lil over 180 lbs! so i have been working out and got back down to 175. so we were teaching doris this past week and she shared something with me about what happened while i was giving her a blessing last week. she said when i sealed the annointing she felt the warmth of our hands go through her whole body and while i was giving the blessing and her eyes were closed it went from dark then turned to a bright white light. it blew me back in my seat and i couldn't believe it. the spirit testified to me and told me how powerful the priesthood really is. the church is true!!! since i have been out here i have become OCD. my bed is made right when i wake up, everything i own is always organized, i wash dishes before i use them, i carry hand sanitizer and use it so much through the day, haha its funny but i'm serious i don't know what happened but i feel a little bit ocd. anyway i love you all and all the support
elder salmon
Monday, May 17, 2010
hey everyone!
this week went by pretty quick but was a great one. we had interviews on tuesday and in my interview with president colton it was so great. we have grown very close in the past week and a half its amazing. it was weird at the end of the interview we normally end with a prayer and as we were about to we both looked at each other and before i could say it he said he just had a feeling to ask if i wanted a blessing instead and that was exactly what went through my head! the blessing was so amazing president colton has diffenantly been called of God. he gave me the exact same blessing that my stake president had given me as i was set apart to come out this last time almost word for word identical! for those who weren't there for my setting apart can ask my mom but in short i have a lot coming my way and i need to mature quick both as a person and in the understanding of this gospel. teaching this week has been unreal i finally feel like i am were i am supposed to be on my teaching skills. i am with some book smart missionaries and thanks to the advice from my boy big hoot i realized that i needed to be the people person that i am. instead of thinking scripture to read during the lesson i listened to both my companions and the investigators and let the spirit guide me in what to say. that was a lot of what elder neil l anderson said while he was here is that the spirit is the converter not you. it was like the handicap was finally taken off and it made so much sense. we set two baptismal dates this week for the 29th of this month. behold the field is white and ready to harvest! so like they say up here in Zephyrhills "GET ER DONE!" haha. debbie is the name of one of the investigators but i want to talk about the other one doris storer. she is 81 and couldn't be more golden. we taught the first lesson and after we told her the joseph smith story and the first vision we asked her what she thinks and she replied i believe he was a prophet and was annointed at that time to restore the gospel. holy cow!! since when do you get that reply at the end of the first lesson?! she has been through a lot in the past few years she has lost both breasts to breast cancer and is about to start treatment for her third case. i would ask all of you in your prayers to pray for her. i had the great opportunity of giving her a blessing and i don't think i will be able to tell you what i said but i know that with all our prayers she will be fine. i'm so blessed for these opportunities that i have been given the past week and a half and i won't leave my mission with any regrets. i read the talk "come what may and love it" i've been keeping positive no matter what and it makes the adversary weak and i love it! i'm low on time but mission conference was unreal and seeing all the missionaries in the mission was great! i have been so welcomed and loved for returning. i want you all to know that i found out as of right now i will be coming home august 1-3 of 2011
i love you all
elder salmon
Monday, May 10, 2010
Hello everyone.
its great to be back here in the florida tampa mission. i am in dade city but am serving in the zephyr hills area and i am with elder cheever (who i came out with the first time) and elder stanford (who was a greeny when i left.) its definately a hick town down here! haha i am loving it the people we tract into are crazy but thats what makes it fun! the first night i was here i got here in time for bible study with the ward and was exhausted from the flight. the next day i had my first lesson with a woman named shauna. the elders tracted into them the week before and were coming back for a lesson. shauna's sister erica wanted to join because she knew a lot of the bible and was active in her church. so we gave her the benefit of the doubt and didn't think she just wanted to bible bash. man were we wrong ha. the lesson started off great and they both were really receptive. then we saw erica pull out some papers that had been printed off the internet and we all looked at each other and knew this wasn't going to be good cuz we had a feeling it was some anti she had found. so the bashing began and man did it get intense. elder cheever then took charge told her that we were leaving because she had come here with a hardened heart and a closed mind. her reply was she just wanted answers so we had said "that if she wanted to know about the catholic church to ask the catholics, if you want to learn about the baptists you go to talk a baptist and if you wanted to know about the mormons you ask a mormon you don't look and print up that crap off the internet" she then went quiet and said ok and we left. what a first lesson!! haha. something that is different about tracting now compared to before is that before we were trying to get people on church tours for the first lesson and now we are trying to just teach at the door and get a return appointment and it has made a world of difference for this mission!! its an adjustment for me but i'm loving the results. before we went out tracting one day what elder cheever and stanford like to do is one elder takes a map of the area and goes in the bedroom and prays for revelation about where to tract while the other missionaries are in the front room praying for the missionary in the bedroom. elder cheever asked if i had ever done this before and i said no so he said try it out then. so i went in the back room with the map and said a prayer looked at the map and found 4 streets that i felt good about so i prayed again for help to cut down the list then looked at the 4 streets and cut it down to 2. i did the same again and felt great about this one street. said another prayer to ask for confirmation that this is the right one and it was confirmed. so we went out and tracted that street. on that street was a hispanic family that had just moved here from conneticut and were recently baptized so we are going to get them to church this next sunday. we got 4 new investigators from that one street!! it was such a great feeling and when we got home i got on my knees and thanked the lord for all the help he had given us. we are teaching 2 part member families that each have a child that is just above the age of 8 and we are looking to baptize them before the end of the month. once i meet them for the first time i will let you know more about them. i love you all and appreciate all the prayers and support!!
love
elder salmon
Mother's Day ! Todd called last tonight and it was INCREDIBLE to hear his voice. He was so excited and sounded great! He loves his new area of Dade City. His companions are work horses and he's keeping REALLY busy. They tracted a lot last week and added more people to their teaching pool. The teaching techniques have changed a bit but he's catching on and said that the mission has done a 180 with reference to obedience. This coming weekend Elder Neil Anderson, from the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles will be in their mission. ALL the missionaries are getting together to hear him speak. Todd can hardly wait to meet up with all his mission buddies that he hasn't seen for a while. He said the weather is really hot and he loves it!! He's working really hard, eating well (good to mom's ears) and is REALLY happy to be back in Florida!!
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Elder Salmon left Salt Lake City this morning at 8:30 a.m. He'll arrive in Tampa at 4:40 pm. The AP's will be picking him up and taking him to Dade City, Florida. He's so excited to be returning to the Florida Tampa Mission. President Colton felt bad he couldn't be at the airport but he had to be in South Florida for a Conference so he'll meet with Todd tomorrow night. Todd is so excited to see him!
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